I'm very tempted to try waxing, but truth be told, I kind of like soaking in the hot bathtub before shaving my legs. It's very relaxing!

Okay, another major step for me today. Stopped by the drugstore and picked up some Astroglide, and went home to play with my new dildo. It looks like this:

Like I said, it's nothing flashy or fancy, but it's nice. Realistic, which is what I wanted. Most of the dildos at the adult store were way too obnoxiously huge, which is not what I want. I'm a natural woman, and I want a natural cock.

Okay, so here goes. I've never done it. I've never taken anything in my body that way before. That way. I drew a nice hot bath and soaked for a bout an hour, getting nice and relaxed, then I took a dollop of Astroglide and rubbed it alover my new dildo, and then took another one and smeared it all over me...down there.

And then I took it inside me.

It was easily the sexiest, most wonderful experience of my life! The pleasure was absolutely indescribable! And the orgasms I had...WOW!!!

The sexiest part was when I was done, I washed up, got dressed in my sexy new panties and shorts, and sat around playing on the internet.

That's when I noticed it.

I was leaking. I was leaking cum from my pussy.
I closed my eyes and went to the bathroom to clean myself off.

I am a woman. Hear me roar.

Beautiful Stacy. You are beautiful and sexy and smart. Enjoy yourself and everything you have to offer. And keep enjoying your dildo.

Things have progressed a lot for transgender people and one of the things that has slowly evolved is that with young children displaying gender dysphoria there is now an attempt to help them, rather then in the past make them bury it, or try to 'cure' them.

The struggle is how far do you go? Kids sometimes do go through phases, so how are you sure if in fact they are transgender when a child may or may not know (hell, hard for an adult going through this).

What makes it difficult is for either m to f or f to m, is that it would be idea to start treatment before puberty, before the 'native' hormones do their work (think about it, young boys and girls aren't physically all that different before puberty). For a M to F, for example, it would stop the thickening of the bones, the development of brow bossa (ridge about the eyes), adam's apples, body hair and especially facial hair, would make the skin stay soft, hair finer, etc and of course the development of the breasts and butt. For a F to M, would stop the development of breasts and so forth and with T the male characteristics.

The problem of course is hormones to s certain extent are permanent, and if you go this path what if it turns out not to be the right one? What they will do as a stopgap is put them on hormone blockers (for a male, spiroaldactone, for example) that stops the testosterone from having as much of an effect if any, for a f to m it would be something to negate estrogen, until they get bit older. It makes a big difference, believe me, any adult trans person will tell you how fucking hard it is to overcome the effects of hormones from adolescence. A beard can take 800 hours to remove, body hair is a pain, the thickened bone structure, adams apple and such can be hard to change, and certain things can make it difficult for a M to F to 'pass'; do it pre puberty and it is a totally different story. An acquaintance is a M to F, who is in adult films, and she has been on HRT since she was 13..but because they started too late, her voice isn't that great thought she is lucky, she otherwise is quite hot (hate her *smile*).

The problem is there is not magic bullet to determine if a boy, for example, is simply happy dressing in girls clothes but is okay as a boy, a gay boy who likes the femme, or a trans girl.....so it is a hobson's choice, with the risk of doing the wrong thing.

My take is if the kid has been worked with by a competent psych type, if they strongly demonstrate this from an early age and it doesnt' seem to waver, it may be a good thing to think of doing the HRT and such or at least block puberty until a decision can be made later. Even thoiugh it isn't easy doing this as a child, dealing with family and the stupidity of other people, in many ways it is a lot easier because of done young a)the person will physically be more presentable/unknown and b)they will have basically had their life as a boy/girl, rather then dealing with the implications of transitioning as an adult, they will have gone to school, gotten a job, etc as their true gender. On the other hand, I am an example of what the difficulties of adult transition can end up leading too..

Thanks Lauren...(and Stickygirl!) I learn more and more everyday....from you lovelys!!....and there is so much to learn!

The Sydney Opera House is staging a show called "Trannie" - there's a link below to an article. You may wish to drop the box office an email to let them know how you feel about making a joke out transgender life...

I would like to see them try to get away with a show making ridicule of the Maoris, or all women, or all men. This is an insult to our being. Too bad there isn't a law where the persons writing the show and producing can be prosecuted.
It certainly is in the field of general harassment and discrimination.

I can't believe a country as great as the USA has its law run by religious extremists: this guy is just another ayatollah. The American Civil Liberties Union has stepped in appealing Oklahoma County District Judge Bill Graves’ refusal to allow trans woman Angela Renee Ingram to make her name legal in the state of Oklahoma.

Yeah, a lot of decisions by health insurers as to what to pay for or not pay for leave me scratching my head. If people are depressed, and self-medicate or injure themselves, it's expensive. You'd think they'd look at the bottom line and try to avoid that, even if concern for the welfare of fellow human beings isn't part of their business model.

As a side note, amazingly, I'm now one of the few people who actually have insurance that would cover hormones and some surgery if I decide to go that way.

The answer is the US isn't as advanced or progressive as we would like to think it is....it is ironic that countries like Argentina, once known for being human rights violators, are more progressive than the US. Australia isn't particularly progressive, they have the same problem the US does, they have a lot of religious conservatives there and the RC in Australia is particularly strong , not a good combination. It is easy to forget that when you get out of the more populous areas in the US, where things are diverse, just how in many ways backwards large swaths of the country are. The judge in Oklahoma may get in trouble for doing what he did, law in almost all 50 states is you have the right to change your name to whatever you want, as long as there is no intent to defraud or run away from debts.

Obviously, to say 'they are all like that' is also a misnomer, it depends on where you are and who you are talking to. Living in NYC you would figure a trans girl would have it easy, but that isn't always the case, there are a lot of stupid people here, too..the young idiots who have infested NYC in recent decades, the ones out in Williamsburg, or the ones who seem to spend all their time in bars getting drunk, are not always the most tolerant of people, on top of everything else they often come from places where gay bashing or trans bashing is still considered sport *sigh*...hopefully they soon learn, like the gang for frat boy types on 8th avenue in chelsea who thought it was good fun to yell 'faggots' at a gay couple walking down the street, unfortunately for them they did it in front of a bar hosting a meeting of gay bikers *evil grin*.

What I have been trying to find out is if people have taken advantage of Texas law and had a legal same sex marriage. Texas (what a big surprise) won't recognize someone who has transitioned and had SRS as legally a female (or male for the other way), which means a trans girl can marry a woman and have a legal marriage......

As a friend of mine told me, all you can hope is that eventually, each day gets better. The country is changing, and even the deep south is starting to change a bit, as economics has shaped a lot of things, and as the older, more rednecky types die out, things will change. Younger people thanks to cable tv and the internet and thanks to going to college, have been exposed to gay people and trans people and are a lot more libertarian then their parents ever were. I was in the Atlanta area recently and I was surprised how more diverse it was than when I was there 20 years ago, and from what I hear, same thing in other parts of the south. The real rural belt may never be a bastion of tolerance, but that also is a dying way of life, rural areas are losing people because young people don't want to live there, in part because it is so homogeneous.

Just found out that the show got renamed from TrAnnie to TrAshley. Woo. There were heated arguments amongst the LGBT community as to whether the show was a good or bad thing: some very vocal supporters in Oz saying the rest of the world should mind it's own business and for people to lighten up.
Overall I thought the petition idea was great: ok it didn't get the show cancelled but at least it showed we are not a silent minority and it got the subject discussed.

If I may be so bold, but i think that we really need to start recognizing the T in GLBT here on this board. I've been here for over a year (including prior to my "transformation", and most of the transgender threads on this particular board are not geared toward actually discussing transgenders and the struggles we face.

So I want this thread to be a form where we can begin a dialogue about the difficulties we face being transgendered. This journey is something that can only be appreciated by others who are journeying down the same path, and I think that it's important that we seek each other out. Lately, I've been feeling lost, alone, and truthfully, very, very sad. I've been desperately trying to fill empty spaces in my soul with little to no avail.

I want to start filling in those voids. With life, with meaningfulness. I want to use this thread to express myself, and I urge my transgender brothers and sisters to do the same. It's time we stopped living in the shadows. It's time we stopped being half alive, half of who we truly are, and embrace our bodies, even if they don't synchronize with our gender, and begin the long, difficult journey to finally, at last, making peace with it.

So lately, it's been really bothering me, the fact that I'm not a woman (biologically). I've been following this wonderful thread, Pregnancy Hormones Running Amok - ICDT, and the dichotomy that I feel is tearing me apart, it fills me with a joy and happiness to read about icandothis' pregnancy. Her words and the way she describes being pregnant, what she's going through, what her and her husband are feeling and experiencing are among the most beautiful I've ever read on Lit. However, it also fills me with a great sadness. A sadness knowing that I will never be able to experience the joy of taking my lover's seed and growing a life inside my body. The hallmark of a woman. It may sound silly to some, but to transgenders, this is something that I think they can appreciate. No matter how much make up I put on, no matter how much money I may save and how many drugs I take and how many surgeries I undertake, I will never never be able to grow a life inside me, and I think that's one of the biggest things that I've been struggling with lately.

So, to all my transgender brothers and sisters, please, let's share our experiences. I believe that by talking about what we're going through is the only way we can move toward making peace with ourselves, and possibly, hopefully, moving toward a world more tolerant and understanding of the struggles that we're experiencing.

LOL! Yup - you need a phrasebook here huh? Okedoki. Since there is SO much sex and gender variation in our LGBT commuity, it was decided the best way to describe people born into and happy with their body type and sex ( in common parlance they are 'normal'!!! ) then they could be called cis-male, cis-girl, cis-female.

It's kinda hair-splitting detail but avoids confusion. If anyone else wants to correct me on that then do so.

The answer is the US isn't as advanced or progressive as we would like to think it is....it is ironic that countries like Argentina, once known for being human rights violators, are more progressive than the US. Australia isn't particularly progressive, they have the same problem the US does, they have a lot of religious conservatives there and the RC in Australia is particularly strong , not a good combination. It is easy to forget that when you get out of the more populous areas in the US, where things are diverse, just how in many ways backwards large swaths of the country are. The judge in Oklahoma may get in trouble for doing what he did, law in almost all 50 states is you have the right to change your name to whatever you want, as long as there is no intent to defraud or run away from debts.

Obviously, to say 'they are all like that' is also a misnomer, it depends on where you are and who you are talking to. Living in NYC you would figure a trans girl would have it easy, but that isn't always the case, there are a lot of stupid people here, too..the young idiots who have infested NYC in recent decades, the ones out in Williamsburg, or the ones who seem to spend all their time in bars getting drunk, are not always the most tolerant of people, on top of everything else they often come from places where gay bashing or trans bashing is still considered sport *sigh*...hopefully they soon learn, like the gang for frat boy types on 8th avenue in chelsea who thought it was good fun to yell 'faggots' at a gay couple walking down the street, unfortunately for them they did it in front of a bar hosting a meeting of gay bikers *evil grin*.

The Argentinian govt recently seized private pensions so they could redistribute wealth. While I believe that transpeople should have all the rights of non-trans people I feel my pension is more important at this point. I still prefer to live here.

The Argentinian govt recently seized private pensions so they could redistribute wealth. While I believe that transpeople should have all the rights of non-trans people I feel my pension is more important at this point. I still prefer to live here.

I never said I wanted to live in Argentina, I was pointing out a specific issue to highlight something about the US, that as advanced as we like to claim we are we have certain things where we are more regressive then a country like Argentina is, that's all. Where you live is always a matter of a sum of things, but it is kind of sad in the home of the free and land of the brave that we have social beliefs that are more in tune with Saudi Arabia or Iran then with our constitution, where religious myth and bigotry is allowed to be law.

So I've been thinking a lot lately about wanting to express my femininity more and more, and it's kind of depressing that I don't know any transgenders in real life. I could really use a girlfriend. You know? Just somebody I could talk to, that can..teach me how to be a woman, you know? Hair, make-up, matching clothes, etc.

Truth be told, I'm a bit depressed too, because I know there's one person I could have opened up to in real life that would have accepted me completely, but she's gone, and I can't get her back.

I guess it would just be nice to meet some transgendered or even genetic girls in real life who would want to be just friends and help me along on my journey.